


how an egg makes another egg

by cicak



Series: cicak's farces [9]
Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Crack, Declarations of Friendship, Fairy Tale Elements, Fairy Tales, Farce, Fluff, Fluff and Crack, M/M, Porn, Slavic Folklore, but about as accurate as the show is, chicken facts, household gods, the cock of legend
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-26
Updated: 2020-04-26
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:20:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23861446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cicak/pseuds/cicak
Summary: “Wait, what?” Geralt says, blinking, the words finally sinking in. “What?”“SEX, GERALT” Jaskier yells, like suddenly he’s hard of hearing. “I WOULD LIKE TO RUIN OUR FRIENDSHIP WITH SEX.”
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Series: cicak's farces [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1816141
Comments: 157
Kudos: 422





	how an egg makes another egg

For Geralt’s money, harvest festivals are the most dangerous time of the Witcher’s year, pound for pound. All magical-using beings know the dangers of casting a spell in such a liminal time, or in a liminal place, like lighting a match in a flour silo; there’s always a risk of some kind of explosion you’re not ready for. When it comes to the harvest, there’s a little too much potentiality, a few too many things crossing over causing a back up at the celestial gates, and a few too many spirits realising that there’s a little bit too much life left in amongst the decay, and making the understandable decision to be angry about that.

Therefore, Geralt avoids harvest festivals as much as possible. Likes to take contracts in the city, where belief gets stuck inside where it belongs, and instead much prefers a nice equinox festival (vernal for preference, if you’re asking), but a midsummer or midwinter festival will do in a pinch. A ploughing festival is perfect, there’s so many little spongy places available to absorb any excess lifeforce, and the various ghouls and beasties can usually be relied on to give him a break long enough to get nice and drunk and, if all the euphemisms go well, enthusiastically laid, in peace. Spring is just the icing on the seasonally appropriate pastry.

This particular village took its festivals very seriously. It wasn’t necessarily a special place, the most interesting thing about it was the name; ostensibly originally named West Egg, the S was stolen off the sign years ago, therefore the place was now known to everyone as Wet Egg. The citizens of Wet Egg were very grateful to their new friend, the white wolf, for ridding them of a very unfortunate and bloody problem that kept eating their children, and so when they asked if he would stay and partake of some more of their happiness and cheer in honour of, well, no one was entirely sure which festival it was, the season meant that it was probably not going to cause any extra problems. Having no actual idea which festival they were celebrating seemed to be a great way to live, in Geralt’s book.

As the sun set, he looked around and saw the land for what it was, and relaxed. The ground was soft, there were bluebells growing everywhere, and it hadn’t snowed for weeks. Life was thriving, and it’s a stronger man than him who turns down free beer and wenchen favour.

Plus, they told him, the bard Jaskier had been booked to perform. They were very excited about this.

“Perhaps, you could be persuaded to get up there with him?” the mayor said, with inquisitive eyebrows that erred towards innuendo, which retreated down again at the look on Geralt’s face. “Or not, of course, whatever you prefer, thank you again for all you’ve done for us” before scuttling away, returning a few minutes later with a smile beneath his beard and three different types of ale on a tray.

Geralt drank all three in quick succession, and then tried to find a nice quiet corner to lurk in for the rest of the night.

He’d judged this corner well, out of the way enough to not be too close to people wanting to make conversation, but not so far away that they forgot about him. A few good baps full of roasted boar and apple sauce and a lot more ale later (when asked his preference he indicated the darkest of them, that tasted like it had twigs in it in the best possible way), Geralt heard the distinctive strumming of a lute and a cheery voice greeting the crowd, and so he got up and lumbered over.

Jaskier looked well. It had been one or two winters since they’d last spent any time together, but it’s a small continent, and Jaskier loves adventure almost as much as he likes attention, and so a tour of the north is always something he’ll book even with the most convoluted of schedules and flimsy of excuses. He catches Geralt’s eye in the crowd almost immediately, nods, but continues singing his bawdy songs that make the crowd first tap their toes, then dance, then disappear off in search of their own dark corners, Jaskier’s honey voice raising temperatures as much as the turning of the earth does.

He doesn’t sing the toss a coin song, or any of the witcher songs, which is just proof that Geralt’s day is looking up. He hates being caught humming his own theme song.

The mayor, now obviously well into his own cups, was pressing Jaskier’s hands between his, and saying a lot of the words that Geralt knows are as good as coin for a thirsty bard. Words like ‘incredible’, ‘beautiful’, ‘inspiring’, ‘passionate’, ‘the best I’ve ever heard’ while his eyebrows asked other questions, questions of certain activities that in Geralt’s opinion, would be very difficult considering the amount of beer the Mayor had drunk.

“Jaskier” Geralt rumbled, over the Mayor’s head, who jumped, ducked a bow and scuttlied off with his eyebrows in retreat.

They hug, and Geralt always forgets that however much Jaskier is annoying and a musician, he is a man, and so doesn’t cling. It’s a strong hug, just long enough to convey the right amount of feeling.

They grab some more beers, and settle down at Geralt’s table.

“You okay?” Jaskier says, after a few mouthfuls.

“Yeah”, Geralt grunted, as more beers were put down in front of them.

“Yeah? I heard about...well. I heard. It’s okay...not to be...okay” Jaskier said.

“I’m...okay.” Geralt said, utterly baffled as to what Jaskier was referring to. Roach was fine, Yennefer didn't currently curse him at the sight of him, winter was over and he had a pocket full of coin. Life was pretty good.

That’s the thing Geralt likes about Jaskier. He isn’t like Yenn or any of the other women of his acquaintance, he really understands how to talk to a guy. None of that advanced feelings bullshit. Just straight to the point.

They talk, or more, Jaskier talks, about politics and the war and consider playing a few hands of Gwent, but instead just continue drinking, until the party fades away around them to just a whisper and an ember.

“I’d…” and Jaskier looks a bit hazy at the edges, because this village is very good at brewing and very generous to its saviours and entertainers, “I really value you, you know?”

Geralt pats Jaskier’s knee, nodding drunkenly. He really does. “Yeah, I know.”

“But...I would really like to ruin our friendship. Really like to. Like, a lot. Like I think about it all the time. About...ruining...our friendship.”

Geralt nods, sagely, but it's mostly still leftover nodding from the earlier statement. “Wait, what?” he says, blinking, the words finally sinking in. “What?”

“SEX, GERALT” Jaskier yells, like suddenly he’s hard of hearing. “I WOULD LIKE TO RUIN OUR FRIENDSHIP WITH SEX.”

Now, Geralt was very drunk, and if this had been less of a mutual plastering, he would have let Jaskier down more gently. What sober Geralt would have said to Drunk Jaskier was “Don’t worry, nothing could ruin our friendship”. If Jaskier was sober and Geralt was drunk, Geralt would have just hidden behind a well placed “hmm” and maybe gone to get more pints, followed by plying Jaskier with enough beer to move him into the same level of drunk, and then said the first thing then.

It’s male etiquette, really, but because Geralt was very drunk, potentially at this level of drunk much more drunk than Jaskier, who had been performing half the night and therefore was several hours of alcohol consumption behind Geralt despite differences in bulk and metabolism, instead he said something that he hasn’t meant for years, which was supposed to be a _joke_ , “We don’t have a friendship to ruin.”

“HAH” Jaskier replied, pointing unco-ordinatedly and still yelling. “SHOWS WHAT YOU KNOW!!! I’M THE BEST FRIEND YOU’LL EVER HAVE!!!”.

Before Geralt could yell back something he could never take back, someone threw one of last season’s cabbages at Jaskier’s head, which exploded in a shower of vegetable sludge over the both of them.

“STOP SHOUTING”, the chucker yelled. “SOME OF US ARE TRYING TO CELEBRATE THE GLORIOUS GLORY OF THE GODS OF THE HARVEST!!!”

“THATS NEXT WEEK” someone else shouted. “THIS IS THE FESTIVAL OF THE ALMIGHTY EGG GODDESS, MAY SHE BLESS OUR CHICKENS WITH SLICK AND CAPACIOUS CLOACAE!!!”

“OH SHIT, SORRY” the original voice. “I SHOULD HAVE THROWN AN EGG. I SWEAR I HAVE ONE SOMEWHERE”.

“You are very lovely,” Geralt said, realising that he had probably fucked that up, as they staggered away under a pelting of eggs, many of which were no longer fresh. “I did not mean it.”

“Hmm?” Jaskier replied several seconds later, the beer having travelled up from his legs to his brain as is often the way of beer. Jaskier was barely able to walk, using Geralt as a crutch, which was inconvenient as Geralt couldn’t really walk either, but it was okay as Jaskier insisted on stopping every few yards, fascinated by the detritus of the world, and almost lost his balance when he stopped to pick up a particularly interesting rock with a hole in it, which he then forced Geralt to look at for the rest of the journey back to the inn.

Once back in the rooms, Geralt lit a candle just long enough to see Jaskier spread out over the bed, propped up on his elbows looking up at Geralt, still dressed to perform and not for bed, but for the bedroom eyes he was giving Geralt, the rest of him rumpled and soft in the half light, and for a moment, Geralt wavered. Thought about dropping onto the bed and pressing his face into the warm softness of the crook of Jaskier’s neck, and then seeing what happened next. In the next moment though, Jaskier’s eyes drifted shut, his head sinking into his chest, and his elbows buckling underneath him, sleep dragging him under by the scruff of his neck, and so Geralt blew out the candle and curled up on the bed not even bothering to remove his boots, and let sleep relieve him of his regrets.

* * *

When Geralt came to, it wasn’t in a bed in an inn of a grateful village. The space was small, warm, dark and yet glowing red with infernal power, and smelled faintly of eggs, and his first thought was one of intense irritation.

For years, people had yelled at him and told him he was going to hell for his sinful ways (which were mostly for continuing to live as something no one had asked him whether he’d wanted to become) and now not only had he died in some suspect way he couldn’t actually remember, but he actually was in hell.

You’d think, Geralt thought, the gods would have looked at the balance of my soul and weighed all the abominations I've killed vs all the morally suspect things a man does for the good of society, when making such an important decision as to the final destination of his soul? Geralt had never aimed for the right tit of Melitele herself, but surely he had earned a small place in one of the outer bosoms of heaven.

Maybe he should have gone to the temple more often, he thought. And probably shagged fewer nuns while he was there.

He shivered. He’d expected hell to be warmer, not to mention less cramped. Not one really for comparative religion, he spread out his legs until he hit something soft and kicked it petulantly.

A familiar yelp swore heavily, gulped in air, swore again, and then retched, obviously the first deep breath it had taken here in hell.

“Jaskier?” Geralt asked, surprised. Surely, not him, here too.

“Fucking hell, you kicked me, you fucking asshole.” Jaskier replied.

Okay, it was him.

“What did you do?” Geralt growled, furious at Jaskier and looking for a reason.

“I don’t know! We just went to sleep after people threw eggs at us.”

“I mean to get into hell, you dumbass.”

“Are we in hell?” Jaskier said, confused. “Really? I don’t _feel_ dead.”

“Have you been dead before?” Geralt asked sarcastically. “How would you know what it feels like?”

“I’ll have you know that no, I haven’t been dead before, thanks,” Jaskier said, rolling over to face Geralt and sitting up so he could gesture more easily. “Excuse me for only losing my death-virginity at the age of 35! I suppose you died impressively young at the hands of some arcane horror or something, and not of alcohol poisoning in a lice-infested cheap bed I could only afford half of.” Jaskier bitched back, and in the dim light Geralt could see that he was actually really quite upset at the indignity of his death.

“I was twelve, actually, and it was a cocktail of drugs to turn me into an arcane horror, if you really want to know.” Geralt bitched back, and then rubbed his face, because why were they bickering over this? God, maybe he should have hung around with more women.

“I can’t believe we’re both in the same hell,” he ground out. “This makes no sense.”

“I know, who would have guessed that blaspheming, sleeping with other men’s wives and copyright infringement would be in the same areola as communing with sorceresses and scrumping” Jaskier pondered.

“Those apples were for Roach,” Geralt protested, genuinely taken aback that all Jaskier seemed to think he had done wrong in his life was sleep with Yennefer and steal apples.

“I know,” Jaskier continued, “You know, I’ve written three death ballads for you? In one you die to save your noble steed, the other you die saving all of us from an impossible evil, and in the last you die at age 736, in bed with three thankful maidens you saved from penury. That one’s really good. I was really looking forward to singing that, eventually.”

Geralt doesn’t know what to say to that, so hums for a long moment before deciding fuck it, they’re dead anyway, he might as well get chatty.

“I always thought you’d be beheaded for sleeping with a princess the night before her wedding, or for writing a song so catchy you’d be put to death to spare us all,” he admits.

“Aww, Geralt, thanks” Jaskier squeezed Geralt’s foot, smiling widely. “It means a lot, really. I mean we all want to go out well, right? This is quite a disappointment. I had so many things I wanted to do.”

Geralt was about to say something along the lines of ‘so while we’re talking, about last night, what you were saying about ruining our friendship’ - when the world moved for both of them. Not in a romantic way, but literally, throwing them around on top of each other, knocking the air out of both of their lungs and rocking around for a few minutes. An earthquake, perhaps? Geralt thought, from where he was pinned under six foot of bard, arm bent at a strange angle behind him.

“Look, I know that you’re sure we’re dead, but I really think that even in hell, I wouldn’t be _this_ hungover. Definitely not drunk enough to die and go to the afterlife.” Jaskier shifted, but then the world moved again, and he slumped back down.

“We had a lot of beer last night.” Geralt said, trying to dislodge himself from under Jaskier’s body through judicious wriggling, when he noticed something out the corner of his eye.

“Jaskier, look”, Geralt said, and pointed best he could at the crack of light that was spilling through what was increasingly looking like their own personal hell.

Jaskier was still talking, though. “No, what I mean is I think it would be worse? I probably only need some water and a couple of hours of sleep. This barely registers as one of the worst hangovers I’ve had this _week_. Definitely not enough to kill me.”

“Get off, look, there.” Geralt said, shoving him. He scooted over, and kicked, hard. The crack spread across the dull red glow of hell, spreading across until it was a bright spider web across the whole sky.

Jaskier stood up, taking a moment to get his balance, and then took a deep breath and shoulder charged the wall of hell, and the whole thing shattered around them.

They staggered out into the broad-daylight of a world that looked very much like their own. Behind them, the remains of an egg, dun coloured and impossibly large, crumbled into dust and shards, its purpose complete.

Geralt took a moment to scope out the environment. They were in a pen, with a high fence and straw on the ground, and when he scuffed his foot it gave way to rough brown dirt, unremarkable. The ground sloped gently away, sort of like a shale beach, but there was no ocean in the distance, just waves of waving corn in one direction, and a beautiful rolling hillside in the other. Both were luridly brightly coloured, but that could still be the hangover.

To his left, he watched as Jaskier dropped onto his haunches, and ran his hand over the ground. Up close, the pen they were in was full of flat stones with holes in them, all shapes and sizes, strewn upon the straw. “Oh no.” Jaskier said, hand going to his pocket and face heavy with realisation.

There was a loud ringing of bells, momentarily deafening, and then shimmering into reality in front of them was something, first an impression of something, then a vague shape, made up from a cloud of threads and dust to start with, but it quickly coalesced into a definite presence, huge and oppressive and terrifying.

“What are you?” Geralt shouted, over the wind.

“THE ALMIGHTY

EGG GODDESS”

Cried the almighty egg goddess.

The almighty egg goddess was kind of like one of those pictures that could either be a crone or a maiden, but instead of a maiden it was a huge shape that depending on your angle and concentration was either a glowing giant hen with feathers that pulsed like a sunset before a storm, proud and majestic and impossibly magnificent, and instead of a crone she was an ancient and mighty goddess, with skin like the ancient leather that the gods themselves use to bind tomes of arcane knowledge, her hair a cloud of the soft-downy feathers that make the best pillows, and her body the kind of plump only wealth and luxury could bring. She was dressed in a fine gossamer wrap made from the silk of corncobs and embellished with fat grubs that glistened like pearls.

Around her neck was an egg that hung from a golden rope, an egg you’d be pleased to get for breakfast, golden brown but pulsing with the colours of the aurora. Somehow, Geralt knew, from some long-deep genetic memory, that if it were to break, terrible things would happen. He also suddenly knew her name.

Meluhha, the almighty egg goddess, the great ayam, the giver of flight, the protector of the flock, first in the pecking order, the eternal sitter, the yolk of the world, looked down her beak/nose at them. When she clucked, it was the crack of lightning through heavy air at the start of the storm, and when she spoke the voice appeared in their heads as the ringing of bells.

“YOUNG ONE

PRAISE ME”

Geralt saw Jaskier’s hair stand on end from the static.

“P-praise to you, oh goddess” Jaskier said, bowing low. Geralt continued standing, for now, arms crossed, waiting and watching. However impressive, she was not his first god.

“YOU HAVE

MY SYMBOL

DO YOU NOT?”

She asked, and Jaskier scrambled around in his pockets, producing the rock he had found the night before, the one with the perfect hole he had almost broken his neck retrieving, holding it up in cupped hands, declaring “I do, I do.”

“THEN I WILL

GRANT YOU

YOUR HEART’S DESIRE”

"Oh wow", Jaskier whispered to Geralt out the side of his mouth. "This really isn’t a normal hangover."

“BUT FIRST,

YOU WILL

DO FOR ME

A SIMPLE

TASK”

"There's always a catch", Geralt grunts back, under his breath.

“Why me?” Jaskier said, bowing lower, until he’s practically kneeling on the floor. “Why have you chosen me for a task?”

“YOU ARE

THE YOUNG

COCKEREL

OF LEGEND,

JASKIER”

The goddess said. “I am?” Jaskier said, startled out of his reverence. ”Really?”

“YES”

“It’s just,” he giggled, nervously, “I always thought of myself more as a lark?” he argued, although perhaps the futility of the endeavor was beginning to dawn on him. “Perhaps a sparrow, or a nightingale?”

“FEEBLE BIRDS!

YOU ARE THE

COCK OF LEGEND,

JASKIER!

I GAVE YOU

TO THE HUMANS

TO BRING THEM JOY”

“Oh”, Jaskier said faintly. “Well, then. That’s a thing.”

“What do you want from him?” Geralt said.

“I NEED YOU

TO RETRIEVE

MY DAUGHTER

IT IS TIME

FOR HER TO

RETURN TO ME

I ALSO GAVE

HER TO THE

HUMANS

TO BRING THEM

SUCCOUR”

“Right, right”, Jaskier said, nodding. “Happy to. What is her name? Do you have her address?”

“HER NAME

IS BOKBOK

THE AZURE

YOUR SISTER.

BRING HER BACK

TO ME,

JASKIER

AND I WILL

FULFIL YOUR HEART’S DESIRE”

“Okay, but, where is she? Or do I need to search for her?”

“I WILL SEND YOU

AND YOUR

PREDATOR/PROTECTOR

TO HER

AND YOU WILL

BRING HER TO ME.

HOLD OUT YOUR HAND

MY CHILD"

She says, and when Jaskier does, a stone appears in it, swirling like the egg around her neck, but flat and with a hole in it, same as the one that had apparently bought them there.

Then, in a blink of an eye, they’re back on the mortal plane, in the middle of a road, the sun creeping towards midday.

In the distance there’s a village, and so they head out towards it.

Geralt is quiet, but even he can’t help himself.

“The cock of legend.” he says, as neutrally as possible.

Jaskier scoffs, but he’s obviously pleased, a smile playing around the corners of his mouth as he chokes back laughter. “Oh, I'm sure you're just hurt that you're not the cock of legend.”

“I've never had any complaints,” Geralt jokes back, smiling himself, before realising that actually yes, maybe he _is_ a little bit hurt.

The village the goddess dispatches them to is like any other in this part of the continent, low, brick houses lining a wide street that doubles as a square for market day. The houses are all the same, apart from one, a house set back behind a shop selling farming equipment, a merchant family. From the street, Geralt can see a large marquee set up in the gardens beyond, and there’s a hum of activity, some kind of party, probably the reason the rest of the village is so empty. As he observes it, a group of children dressed in their finery run outside to play in the road, their velvet clothes immediately caked in dust and their hair, carefully beribboned, coming undone as they roll around in the street, shrieking with laughter. There are pennants and flowers decorating the house, and cheering coming from inside periodically. As they approach, they see an exhausted middle-aged woman sat in a garden chair, fanning herself outside with a large hat, her stays loosened over her fine, embroidered linen dress.

“Madam,” Jaskier says, bowing deeply, just outside the perimeter. “Forgive us for interrupting you while you are resting. We are on a strange quest, but perhaps you can answer us. Do you perhaps know of someone in the village who has a strange chicken? One that isn't like normal birds?”

“Well,” the woman says, slowly. “We _did_ have one. Beautiful thing. Good layer. Always double yolks. Practically a pet, she always behaved herself, never fouled inside the house. And, well...she was blue.”

“Blue?”

“Yes. My son found the egg, pretty thing, the day his sister was born. We put it under one of our trusty hens to hatch, even though it looked mighty weird, I tell you. That chicken almost starved to death, she took it so seriously, even after her own chicks hatched, she sat on that egg until it was done. We had to feed her by hand, she just wouldn’t get off the egg until it hatched. This was years ago, mind. Twenty-three, nearly twenty-four, since it’s my daughter’s wedding day today. Anyway the chick that hatched was gold, rather than yellow, such a pretty little thing, but when she grew up she was blue.”

“What do you mean, ‘had’?” Geralt asked

“Hmm?” the woman said, obviously avoiding the question.

“You said you _had_ a blue chicken.”

The woman looked stricken. “Well she went off the lay, you see. She's old, probably older than any of our other hens. It hurt, but, well, it's Katka’s favourite, she does love my chicken stew. It was all she asked for her wedding feast, “Mother,” she said, “All I want for my wedding feast is your chicken stew, and the recipe to grow on.” Well, I can’t say no to her, can I? We used the best wine, and herbs. Cooked it for a long time, but didn’t need to, honestly, the meat wasn’t tough at all. Good to the last, that little bird.”

“Oh god.” Jaskier says, grasping his hair in anguish.

“Is there anything left?” Geralt said, as the woman started to look uncomfortable at the display of emotion.

“Of course not,” she retorted, “my stew is legendary, and this is a wedding, after all. Well, there's bones and the head and the feathers, if you want. We were going to give them to the cat, but poor Roger, he was ever so upset, so they’re still in the pantry.”

“Your husband?” Geralt asked.

She looked at him oddly. “No, the rooster. He won't crow. Let's the rest of the hens bully him and the cat is getting ideas as it is. He'll be in the pot next feast day himself if he doesn't snap out of it.”

She gets up and beckons, and leads them into the yard, away from the party. “No offence, but we don’t need your kind here while the wedding’s on”, she huffs, while she disappears to collect the remains of the princess, and while she’s gone and Jaskier is having a breakdown by the pigsty, Geralt eyes Roger up. He's a handsome bird, glossy black and russet red, with a proud comb and a wattle that makes him look like a grand vizier. He is pecking the ground, but it doesn't look like his heart is in it. If it's possible for a chicken to look suicidal, that would be how Geralt would describe Roger.

The woman returns and hands Jaskier a bag, and pats his cheek. "We knew she was special, a gift, a sign that someone was looking after us.” Her hands clench in her skirts, “I hope it isn’t a poor omen for poor Katka’s wedding. She’s been so excited."

They leave, and Jaskier gets out the stone, and prepares to use it, but Geralt tells him to wait a moment, and darts back to the yard, now empty of anyone to witness his theft but the sow sunning herself in the corner, and returns a minute later with Roger the mourning caller tucked under his arm.

They return to the chicken realm through the eyestone, but none of them seem very happy about it, least of all Roger, who the moment they land struggles out of Geralt’s arms with a harsh peck to the soft skin of his elbow.

Geralt drops him, and then the three of them are startled as the Egg Goddess materialises in front of them. Roger hides behind Jaskier's legs in fear and wonder.

“TELL ME, OH

GREAT COCK,

THE NEWS”

“I’m so sorry,” Jaskier gibbers, bowing low, “We were too late. They...I don’t know how to say this. They ate her. They gave us her feathers, and...the rest...but, she was long dead when we arrived.”

“DO NOT CRY

YOUNG COCK!

IT IS OUR FATE

SHE WAS SENT

TO GIVE THE GIRL

WHAT SHE NEEDED,

WHEN SHE NEEDED IT

IT IS WHAT

I ASKED OF HER

AND THAT SHE DID

A GOOD DAUGHTER”

And then the bag of the princess’ remains lifts itself on a zephyr wind, and drifts over to her mother.

Taking the bag of the remains of the Princess Bokbok, the goddess pressed then within her human hands, her wings spread wide behind her, and the bag began shrinking and compressing, until the remains fit into the space between her two cupped hands, and when she opened them, all that remained was an egg.

She placed it on the ground, into a nest that had appeared out of the ether, made of simple straw and woven neatly. The egg was blue and flecked with gold, and Roger the cockerel circled it warily.

“WE COME FROM THE EGG

OUR BONES AND FEATHERS

RETURN TO IT

THE REST IS TRANSIENT

MERE FLESH

MERE ALBUMEN

BUT OUR BONES AND FEATHERS

AND THE CRY OF THE DAWN

ARE MADE OF STERNER STUFF

IT DOES NOT DECAY EASILY”

Roger stands before her, and bows, as the goddess touches his head, strokes down his feathers, and before them he grows larger, his feathers becoming as glossy as the night sky, speckled with stars, and when he opens his eyes, they glint like obsidian.

“MY CHILD

COME TO MY SIDE SIT ON THE EGG

KEEP YOUR WIFE WARM

SHE WILL RETURN TO YOU”

The grand rooster, bows to his goddess, and delicately sits on the blue and gold egg, and if a chicken can look holy and serene, Roger veritably pulses with it.

The goddess turns back to them, and beckons Jaskier forward.

“NOW MY CHILD

I PROMISED YOU

YOUR DEEPEST DESIRE

STATE IT TO ME”

Geralt can’t hear the words that Jaskier says, he mutters them so quietly, so privately, but he sees the way the goddess looks at Jaskier fondly, touches him with her hand and says to him,

“YOU DO NOT NEED

TO WISH FOR WHAT

YOU ALREADY OWN”

Jaskier shakes his head, and then whispers something else, and the queen waves her wings, and a lute appears by his side, even grander than the one given to him by the king of the elves, golden and soft, somehow, a long neck like a swan, somehow looking almost alive and inlaid with a pattern of feathers that look almost real enough to stroke and feel against your fingertips.

“THANK YOU

I WILL SEE YOU

AGAIN”

She says, and Jaskier vanishes.

The empress turns to Geralt and the voice he hears in his head is stern, chiding, terrifying, more terrifying than all the kings, queens and Vesemir put together.

"HE IS YOUR FRIEND,

PREDATOR

DO NOT DENY HIM

WHAT HE HAS

MORE THAN EARNED

BECAUSE IT AMUSES YOU

TO HIDE YOUR FEAR

IN DENIAL

TELL HIM YOUR TRUTH

AND YOU WILL BE BLESSED"

“Okay”, Geralt says, crossing his arms, and bowing just enough for it not to come across as sarcastic.

“NOW”

The goddess intones -

“SPEAK YOUR TRUTH

OR I WILL KEEP YOU HERE

AND WE HAVE

NO USE

FOR PREDATORS”

“Fine,” Geralt growls, "Jaskier is my friend", and as soon as the words are out of his mouth he’s caught in another dust cloud, and lands, unceremoniously, on a road, just outside Wet Egg. He spots Jaskier lying on the ground a few feet away, and jogs over to him, consumed with concern.

Breathless, Jaskier allows Geralt to pull him back to his feet. They’re very close, and his eyes are very blue, as blue as Princess Bokbok, now Geralt realises, a supernatural blue. Surely he would have noticed this before? Or had he never let himself get this close?

“Thanks,” he says. “For saving me.”

“Is it true? What the goddess told me?”

“Yes. Yes it is.” and Geralt starts to lean in, when Jaskier stops him with a hand to his lips.

“Say it.” he whispers. “I have to hear it.”

“You’re my friend, Jaskier.” Geralt husks, and this time it's easy, easy to say this little truth, rather than saying the other things that threaten to trip off his tongue.

“Good.” Jaskier smiles then, and it's a good smile, hungry and slightly feral. “Then,” and his voice is husky, excited, a mere breath away from Geralt’s, “I’ve been waiting a long time to do this. I’m going to fucking _ruin_ this friendship.” and kisses him.

The kiss is short, but full of promise, and Geralt doesn’t want to wait, would like to have Jaskier right there in the road, but instead Jaskier takes his hand, and kisses the back like he’s a maiden, like he’s a damsel that needs rescuing, and pulls him after him back towards the village.

After a few steps the intensity picks up, and then they’re running, hand in hand, back to Wet Egg, to the inn. It’s a beautiful spring day, and the road is lined with bluebells, and it seems like in the door of every house, the chickens of the house cluck with contentment.

In their room, bed rumpled from where they were stolen from sleep, but otherwise clean and fresh, Geralt manhandles Jaskier down and does what he wanted the night before, puts his face in the space between his shoulder and neck, and breathes, breathes in the masculinity and the scent of him, and groans, low and feral, like he is a wolf, a predator, but then Jaskier puts his hand on his neck, and Geralt melts, lets Jaskier pull his head up and kiss him, lets him guide him to take his boots off, putty in his hands, remade, and there’s magic in his eyes, blue flecked with gold, and Geralt is lost as he’s bourn down into the covers, and kissed like he’s the entire world.

It’s easy, under the influence of magic and words to let himself go, enjoy the male simplicity of Jaskier, of the way he doesn’t wait or hesitate, but doesn’t push either, just goes with it, plays Geralt’s body like his lutes, lets his fingers and mouth and the press of his body wring music out of him, until he’s hard and yearning and gasping, making noises he’s never, ever, heard himself say before, in bed or otherwise.

“Tell me,” Jaskier mumbles, as his fingers stroke along Geralt’s cock, not legendary but certainly worth a folk tale or two, “Tell me again”,

“You’re...god...you’re my friend...Jaskier, please”

“Hmm”, Jaskier smiles, and Geralt realises why people find it so irritating when he does it, because it could mean anything, but then Jaskier takes him in his mouth, and the hmm takes on a whole new meaning, the vibrations and the slickness and the way that Jaskier touches him, so slick and so sure.

He begs, by the end, begs Jaskier to take him, tells him the things he didn’t think he’d be able to say, that he loves him, that they’re best friends, and then Jaskier is helping him grip the headboard, gentles him, and takes his time, takes an agonisingly long time to creep his fingers inside Geralt’s arse, to make room for himself there the way he made a nest in Geralt’s stupid human heart, and then pushes his cock in, and Geralt shakes, shakes, shakes with the intensity of it.

Jaskier doesn’t jackhammer him, doesn’t burn himself out quickly, instead takes his time, barely moves to start with, just holds himself there until Geralt can feel the pulse of his blood, can feel his shoulders raw with kisses from Jaskier’s beautiful mouth, until he takes the lead, pushes back himself, and hears Jaskier’s shocked, pleased gasp, and then they’re fucking, slow and steady, more a grind than a thrust, Geralt fisting himself in time and mimicry of the way his body grips Jaskier’s cock, and it lasts a long time, but somehow not long enough, before he comes and Jaskier crows in triumph and spills inside him, hot and wet and filthy beautiful all the same.

“So, how do you feel, having taken the cock of legend” Jaskier smirks, once they’re lying in each other’s arms, and he’s stroking his fingers through Geralt’s chest hair as they lounge in their filthy sheets, exhausted and dusty and wrung out like saturday washing.

“Alright”, Geralt replies. “It’s definitely in my top three.”

Jaskier makes a rude noise, and bites Geralt’s right nipple, which just about gets him going again, but any future ploughing was interrupted by a pounding on the door. Their time is up, the landlord, nicely, yells at them, so get their stuff and get out.

Where shall we go? Jaskier asks, as he struggles back into his suit. The red suits him, and with two lutes strapped to his back, he looks like a witcher, in a way, ready to produce a song that could down men or monsters.

“I only have one request.” Geralt says, sneaking a kiss before they leave. “No more fucking festivals.”

**Author's Note:**

> I sent a snippet of this to my best friend and she said ‘it was good but I could do without the slick cloacae’ and so obviously I went and made the cloacae plot relevant because I don’t write normal fics in this fandom and I am eternally in love with my own bullshit, so first off I’d like to apologise to crimeandcricket, sorry I am a terminal disappointment.
> 
> Anyway, originally the story was more conventional, where Jaskier just seduces Geralt with nice things, but 1. [I’ve already written that](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22352902) and 2. Where’s the fun in that? So I drank 2 martinis and realised the answer was there all along, and then I did 5 minutes of research and learned about Kikimora and Kurinyi Bog and hag stones and it was meant to be, but also that since the show made the kikimora a swamp spider, I didn’t have to be particularly adherent to slavic gods either.
> 
> I had chickens growing up, and have a lot of affection for them. While doing very very light research I found that one of the earliest mentions of what might be a chicken is as the Royal Bird of Meluhha, one hypothesis of which was that it was a city in the Indus Valley Civilisation and it was through them that chickens were traded into the middle east and then the rest of the world, but it was as good a name for a chicken goddess as I could think of myself. 
> 
> ...and then it was just banter and really, really bad bilingual chicken jokes only like five people will get. (If you are in the venn diagram of witcher fan|bahasa indonesia/melayu speaker|familiar with the works of jesus h christ, shout it out and tell me how I’m going to hell for the great ayam joke.) 
> 
> Thanks to strangeallure and deputychairman for listening to my tipsy ramblings about the almighty chicken goddess, may she bless all our cloacae with double-yolkers.
> 
> [I'm on tumblr, so lets be friends](http://cicaklah.tumblr.com)
> 
> If you tell me you liked this I might end up writing more stupid witcher crack so here comes the beep, you know what to do.


End file.
